Salsa Africana

Jan 22nd

A brilliant day today. It’s Gacaca day here in Gitarama so I don’t have to go to work. Gacaca is the system of people’s courts set up after the genocide to allow justice and reconciliation. People accused of crimes and atrocities are brought to face with their accusers (often the relatives of those they murdered) and brought to account. All shops shut. Matatas don’t run into the town. People aren’t supposed to work; the idea is that the whole community takes part in the trial and judgement process.

Well that’s the theory. Gacacas have been going on for too long and people are tired of them unless the accused is directly relevant to them. Most people sit in clumps along the roadside banks and chatter. Matatas cruise slowly up and down the main road and dodge the traffic police cordon. But the place is full of police and army today; we think it must be quite a serious case they’re trying. Someone said they thought it was of a person who had murdered innocent people in 1994 by burying them alive.

What it reminds you is that here in Rwanda your next door neighbour, or the person you’ve just passed in the street, might not be a victim of the madness but a perpetrator. It’s an uneasy thought if you’re buying your vegetables from them, or working alongside them at the District Office and making friends with them. You simply don’t know about people’s pasts unless they open up to you.

Anyway, Gacaca meant I was able to go to Tom’s office and use their internet wire and at last, AT LAST, I’ve been able to put my entire diary to date onto the blog. Even better, I’ve been able to put my Kigali photos on as well. I’m hoping I’ll be able to repeat this each week, so hopefully you’ll get some pictures of our flat and/or of Gitarama town during the next fortnight!

In the afternoon it rained, it thundered, it poured. A heavy downpour’s the only time the steady stream of pedestrians outside our windows stops, as they huddle under gable ends or slide on the mud in their flip-flops.

So, of course, in the middle of the heaviest rain there arrives the VSO pick-up truck with more furniture for me. A coffee table, two easy chairs, a book case, a locking cupboard and a couple of coat racks. We don’t really need the coat racks but we’ll find a use for them somewhere. The locking cupboard is intended for my bedroom but I don’t need it (I have fitted shelves and wardrobe), but it’s just what we need for the kitchen. The calor gas cooker will fit on top and it raises it to a sensible height for grown men to cook on! Likewise the bookcase is just what we need for storing pots and pans. A pity all of it is soaked (they forgot to put a tarpaulin over it when they left Kigali), and as I write we have a lounge full of soaking wood, dripping onto the floor tiles. Also, they managed to shear off the key to the locking cupboard so it arrived locked and unlockable. After a bit of fiddling we managed to get it undone. But it’s not really a problem – who needs a locking cupboard to store food things?

I discovered today that BlueBand butter spread is the ideal lubricant for squeaky doors. Now I can go to the loo in the night without waking up half the neighbourhood!

Finally on this excellent day, we went for tea to Karen’s (yes, that’s twice in three days), and then on to Salsa class. Me, two girls from FHI, a German girl who is helping run an orphanage here in Gitarama and one of her Rwandan male helpers, and a bunch of local women. The class is free, and we just have to pay “Taxi Thomas” for the ride. The class is led by a German woman who is simply brilliant at teaching the moves. I try to remember what we’ve been told about the social acceptability of married white men associating with unmarried Rwandan women, but circumstances take over. So by the end of the evening I’m happily dancing with this stunning Rwandan girl, a student at the Catholic University here, and trying to chat her up with sweet nothings while remembering to keep my feet moving and not tread on her (dainty) feet. Oh, and that’s after flinging my German partner around when we found a bit easy enough to show off….. She’s only about 25. I never learn, do I?

High point – getting blogging again; salsa. Why, after having been to Colombia and Cuba, do I have to wait till I’m in Rwanda to learn how to Salsa? Isn’t life great!

Low point of the day - discovering that despite all this soggy furniture having arrived, I’m still missing a table and a couple of “hard” chairs. I s’pose they’ll come eventually!